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V. C. Morris Gift Shop

V. C. Morris
Gift Shop

San
Francisco, California. 1948-49

Architect:
Frank Lloyd Wright

During the sixteenth years that
took the design and construction of the Guggenheim Museum, Frank Lloyd Wright
had the opportunity to test some of the ideas he was developing for the art
centre in other projects such as the V. C. Morris Gift Shop. This small retail
project in San Francisco is featured by a spiral shape ramp of its interior
that follows the same principle that the gallery of the Guggenheim Museum.

The Frank Lloyd Wright design
is located in an existing building with a square skylight. For his project, the
architect could experiment with the relation of a "shoe box" with the
spiral staircase that is lighted up with the existing skylight of the building.
As a cylinder encloses the staircase, the architect located the secondary room
such as office space or restrooms in the back areas, enhancing the vertical
effect of the ramp. Likewise the skylight is designed with two different circle
sizes, providing both natural and artificial light.

The V. C Morris Gift shop project
is finished with the radical brick facade that Frank Lloyd Wright imagined. As
he stated, he did not want to expose the merchandise of the store in the
facade. Then , he creates a flat brick facade and creates a monumental half-brick,
half-glass tunnel that introduces the pedestrians into a very lightened space.
The only ornamental details of this facade is two concrete bands, one that
creates the plinth and another that creates the top of the building and a
vertical texture brick band left to the
entrance arch.